Investing in artificial intelligence (AI) stocks isn't just about setting yourself up for 2025, but also positioning yourself for the next decade. AI innovations won't stop in 2025, and with the stock market being a forward-looking machine, you're better off taking the long-term view rather than just narrowing in on what will happen in 2025.

Artificial intelligence continued to be a driving force behind stock market returns in 2024. Here are some of the stocks that have benefited the most.

Advances in artificial intelligence (AI) and the excitement around their potential drove the stock prices of some of the biggest companies in the world higher in 2024. But not every AI innovator was a big winner.

Equity analyst Dan Ives has made a quite a few prescient calls in his career. In the last year alone, he predicted the Nasdaq Composite would hit 20,000, and he remained bullish on Palantir despite widespread skepticism.

Known as one of the U.S. government's most important vendors, Palantir Technologies (NASDAQ: PLTR) and its data gathering and analytics solutions have been used for such critical tasks as fighting terrorism and tracking COVID-19 cases.

The U.S. stock market ended 2024 on a high note, with the benchmark S&P 500 index up by 23.3%. That came on the heels of its 24.2% rise in 2023, so overall, the S&P was up by 53.2% since 2022 -- one of its best two-year stretches of the 21st century.